


Do you ever get lonely?

by internetfeet



Category: Xafrin DND
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-24
Updated: 2019-12-24
Packaged: 2021-02-25 06:22:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,522
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21931399
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/internetfeet/pseuds/internetfeet
Summary: The night following Eredas's death, Mila sits and takes watch in the catacombs. Sauna is concerned for her well-being and goes to check up on her.
Relationships: Sauna&Mila
Kudos: 1





	Do you ever get lonely?

**Author's Note:**

> ACTUAL RP between me and Sarah, because RP channel got too hectic. Enjoy some soft kids. Also general warning that some talks about insecurities comes up, so tread carefully please!

Mila sits and writes in her journal, lit by the dim fire in the center of camp. She and a few others are sitting to keep watch on different sides. She'd be switching out about 3 hours in. She was very exhausted, but a lot had happened, and she needed time to be in the quiet before sleeping. Oath floats above, whistling a tune, and she tries her best to not get too agitated by it.

Sauna sits, eyeing Oath suspiciously. He seems like he might be the main concern for people on watch at the moment. 

He turns to see Mila writing in her journal again and he takes out an old notebook and rips out a blank page before putting it away. He scribbled down something on the paper and rolls the crumpled up paper to Mila. “Hello,” the note says. He crouches in her direction waiting to see if she reads it.

Sauna notices his note stop short, and being not that far away from her at all, he extends his leg, sliding the not until it bumps into her.

Mila notices some movement in her periphary and feels something touch her knee. She looks down to see the crumpled up paper and looks to her right to see sauna. She gives a questioning look.

Sauna mimes uncrumpling a piece of paper and nods encouragingly. She eyes him suspiciously and picks up the paper, uncrumpling it to see the word hello on it. She holds back a laugh, putting her hand to her face. She writes something on it and folds it into an intricate envelope looking thing, and flicks it in his direction.

Sauna nearly jumps to grab the paper and carefully unfolds it despite his precious crumpled to read what she wrote.

"What do you want, nerd?"

Sauna writes something, refolds it, and throws it back at her, aiming it like it’s a dart. The paper somehow manages to land perfectly back into her lap where her journal is.She unfolds it.

“To talk to you.

  
  


When you’re ready.”

Mila sighs. She looks back over at Sauna, and pats the dirt floor next to her. Its cold and damp, but not as damp as the swamp has been, surprisingly.Sauna crawls over and takes a seat next to her. He leans towards her briefly and raises an eyebrow. “Hello”

"I believe we've established greetings now." She says, quietly, as to not wake anyone.

Sauna sighs. “I guess you’re right.” He glances at some of the others. “Are you still feeling bad?I mean- I don’t know….what are you feeling?”

She looks down at her journal, thinking about her response. "I'll be honest, I'm not sure what I'm feeling. I know its not...good."

“I could guess. And you could tell me if my guess feel correct or not.” He shrugs.

"You like to play games, dont you?" She leans onto her hand, looking up at him. "Sure."

“That’s not—Well, yes. Okay.” He shakes his head, getting rid of whatever thought he was having and thinks for a moment. “Do you feel responsible in some way?”

"For?"

“The outcome of our recent fight. Whether it be something you did or did not do?”

Sauna cycles through the various emotions he’s noticed Mila show in camp over the past day, hoping he had the right guess.

"I don't think I'm responsible for Eredas's death. Am I upset about it? yes. He was the only other person here who knew how the curse works, and he didnt seek out help when it was early enough to do so." She bitterly looks out into the darkness of the catacombs in front of them, dim green lights just barely making shapes.

“...I don’t think he knew as much as you think he did.” He looks down at his feet. “Certainly not any more than you do. You’re so focused on the curse—which I get. I have been thinking on it a lot lately, even before the fight. It’s why I was out in the woods alone, but don’t you ever, I don’t know. Stop thinking about it?”

She rolls her pen in her hands, fiddling. She does a small laugh. "You sound like my friends back home."

“Yeah? You talked to them about it too?” He says, interested in hearing about her friends

"Not for a long while. A lot of them moved away." she pauses. "They would invite me out to the tavern, or shopping trips a lot while I was first starting work. I think it comes as no surprise that I became very consumed with my work very early on." She holds the pen down on the paper, a small little ink pool forming. "After awhile they stopped asking me to go. They weren’t mad...I think I just disappointed them."

“You seem consumed by it even now. They must miss you incredibly.” He notes her pressure on the paper. “You didn’t miss them, every time you had to decline their invitations?”

She seems to struggle with a way to say things for a second. "Of course I missed them. I just...I wanted to be a doctor so bad for so long, and I was so close to actually doing things, that I just was...I don’t know...desperate to finally get there." 

She kinda coughs, but it sort of sounds like shes holding back a sob, it’s hard to tell. "It's unfair how hard I worked to do all of these things, and nothing ever worked...I tried so hard."

Sauna rests a hand on her shoulder carefully. She may not want him touching her. “Nothing worked? What do you mean? I can tell you tried hard. You’re a wonderful doctor.” He says, moving his other arm around freely without the same pain he showed earlier. The arm she cast cure wounds on.

She doesn’t flinch away from the touch, but her shoulders bunch up. "There’s still a curse. People still die. You saw Eredas....that’s normal for me to see. I need to help these people and I can't." she hiccups a bit, a sob coming out.

“Why should the whole burden of curing this curse fall to you alone. It shouldn’t.” He uses his hood to put out his hair, being that he’s sitting so close.

She puts her face in her hands, embarrassed she got so worked up, but not being able to stop some tears getting out. Theres a few minutes as she attempts to stop sobbing, the tears not wanting to stop. 

She takes a deep breath and removes her hands, her face wet. "I tried to get help. But the Queen and her court just...don’t seem to fucking care."

“You’re allowed to show emotion, you know...” Sauna looks around then back to Mila. “You don’t have to hide” 

“I’m trying my best to understand. If this curse is so severe, as it seems to be, why do you think you struggled so much to get help? Has the curse affected you in some way that it hasn’t affected them?

"People lost hope. And I just...I like to help people. Even if it’s not my job, I like to help people. And this is something I worked to do to help people with and I..can't."

“You are...a magnificent mind.” Sauna laughs like he’s baffled. “Your knowledge is beyond me—you’re so smart. But, to think that you have to solve this on your own, that you have to figure it out? You have to know that’s irrational.”

She laughs bitterly, the tears still running down her cheeks. "I know its not logical! The logical part of my brain knows this!.. but just,the emotional part of me just...thinks Im not good enough, and then shuts down whenever anything bad happens."

Sauna wraps his arm around her, doing his best to comfort her.

“Not good enough?”

“I know it can be easier to shut down sometimes but that’s no good for you in the end...Not good enough...” Sauna trails off, staring ahead, barely able to consider such a thing. 

“You’re so much better than you give yourself credit for. You’re smart and talented, and have proved that time and again in the short time I’ve known you. You’re more than enough. So much more,” he says, almost defiantly..

Sauna sighs, calming himself down. “You know, I was going to ask you something a while back... But I think I’m more sure of the answer.”

She wipes some more tears from her eyes, the most of it starting to calm down. "what were you going to ask me?"

"Do you ever feel lonely? That’s what I was going to ask.”

She laughs. She leans into his hug now, some tears still falling, but otherwise calmer than a few seconds ago. "yeah, I do."

“A lot?”

"Often, at least."

Sauna leans his head back and looks up. “How do you bear that?”

"I didn't." she pats his hand where it pokes out around her shoulder from the hug. "But I suppose I'm doing a bit better at bearing it now."

Sauna jolts his head forward when she says she didn’t. “I’m sorry. That must have been rough”

“I don’t mean to pry on your life, Mila” He shakes his head realizing he’s been asking a lot of questions again.

"That's ok. You were worried." she closes her journal, leaning heavier onto sauna. "I don't suppose you wanna give me some story about your life now." she teases.

“I have been really worried. You were acting different and I got concerned and wanted to make sure you’re okay. I’ve been lonely too, so you can rest assured that you’re not alone in that regard. And you can talk to me if you ever need to.” 

He laughs a bit at himself. “Haha what kind of story would you like to hear about my life? I’m sure I can oblige.”

"What did you do back home? I feel like I have some idea of the skills you have, but they can be used in all kinds of situations."

“Well, I, like you spend my time helping people. Haha not in the same way as you of course. Im no doctor. But I’m good at fighting, defending, snooping”

He tilts his head side to side. “I suppose you could call me a vigilante of sorts” Sauna takes off his gloves and stretches his fingers

"Oh, so you're a hero?" She gives a little playful smirk up at him.

Sauna smirks back. “I would say so. The hero of Hellhaven!” He quietly proclaims

She giggles. "Any particular stories of your escapades?"

“Sometimes it’s helping and elderly man move boxes but sometimes it’s protecting a scholar from thugs. Let’s see, something particularly interesting?... Let me think.”

He turns to look at her. “There was the time a magical artifact went missing from the local magic institution. We’re a small island but we still have scholars of the arcane all the same. A strange helmet was stolen” He says dramatically. “I had to hunt it down and steal it back!”

"And you decided to do this all on your own, or did you overhear people talking about the need for the amazing mysterious town vigilante." She goes along with his dramatic facade, wanting to hear him go on.

He laughs, “I decided to...hmm. That I might as well put my talents to good use.”

"ah." Shes smiling now. Entertained by this odd story, she believes hes a vigilante, but she knows hes playing up some things. "And who had stolen it?"

“Oh there are many criminals in Hellhaven. I tracked it down to a local shopkeeper, who wound up on the island after being exiled from his own home. The helmet had some magical property that allows the wearer some kind of extra knowledge. I don’t know if he was planning to sell it or use it but I stole it back before that could happen.” Sauna rubs his chin with his bare hand thinking about it. He smiles and looks at Mila.

"I wonder if the shopkeep had a good reason for taking it." Mila questions quietly.

“I’m sure he did. He was not punished.” Sauna rests his cheek in his hand. “I refused to reveal his identity, and he never even knew I was there”

Mila has more or less began leaning on sauna, similar to two nights ago when she had been tipsy. This time though, she's just exhausted but she looks better than she had for the better part of the day. "So why did you decide to come here? You said you volunteered?"

Sauna thinks back, leaning against Mila just as much as she’s leaning against him. He thinks back. “Kind of! I’m more like a proxy. The letter was meant for an ex-member of the council of our town, one who is no longer with us and hasn't been for some time. So the council were the ones to receive the letter. They were meeting on the matter of sending someone in his place—the danger that person would be in. I just happened to be in the room when they did. I saw the opportunity and I took it. I volunteered to do it because none of them would and I thought someone needed to

“Don’t get me wrong, I’m no council member, I just ended up having to go to their meetings sometimes.” He laughs.

Mila senses that there’s something he's leaving out intentionally. But she can tell he's not making any of what he said up. She'll leave it alone for now. He'll tell her if he wants to. "Well," She says, looking up as Oath flys by, seeming to check on things in the wall. "I'm glad you volunteered to be here."

Sauna looks her over as her eyes follow Oaths form. “I’m glad I did too.” 

He blinks a few times taking in their strange new camp. “I want you to be happy.” Sauna shrugs. He shakes his head. Yeah, that’s what he meant to say.

"I'll work on it." She says. She should probably wake someone else up for watch, she's so tired.

“You’re good enough.” He grins. “I hope you will.” He pushes her a little from where he’s leaning on her. “Let me know if you need any help with that.”

He feels how heavy she’s laying onto him as he pushes, then pats her head and scoffs. “You look like you could use some rest.”

She takes a big deep sigh and pushes off of him. "yeaaaaaaaah. I should wake someone else up for watch before I do." She looks out at the group, not sure who should be up next.

“I can certainly continue. I won’t be going to sleep just yet!”

She eyes him. "Just don't stay up all night, ok?" She gets up from her spot, grabbing her satchel and pulling out a sleeping bag to be closer to the dim fire.

“Hah, you got it, Dr. Mila” He nods emphatically and salutes.


End file.
